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The much-touted Google-backed AI data centre set to come up in Visakhapatnam has triggered a fresh row between the TDP and YSRCP in Andhra Pradesh.
Reacting to a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by YSRCP MP from Tirupati Maddila Gurumoorthy, state IT Minister Nara Lokesh accused the opposition party of being ‘anti-development’ for challenging “India’s largest FDI investment,” the Google AI data centre.
MP Gurumoorthy, however, said that this was a misrepresentation of his PIL. He added that he was challenging the policies under which land was being allotted to several tech firms’ campuses in Andhra Pradesh, sometimes at the “nominal price” of 99 paise per acre.
So far, the state government has allotted land to Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Cognizant, and other companies in Visakhapatnam at 99 paise.
“The PIL does not target any individual company or any single land allotment,” the YSRCP MP said in a statement issued in response to Lokesh’s comment. He also alleged that these policies lack transparency and safeguards to ensure enduring benefits to the state while transferring valuable public lands to private parties at heavily subsidised costs.
While the 480 acres of land allotted for the Google AI data centre in the name of a company called Raiden Infotech is mentioned in the PIL, it is one among several examples to show the court how land allotments are being done in an arbitrary manner, the MP said.
What the PIL says
The policies the MP has challenged are the Andhra Pradesh Information Technology (IT) and Global Capability Center (GCC) Policy 4.0, the AP Land Incentive for Tech Hubs (LIFT) Policy 4.0, and their operating guidelines.
The LIFT Policy allows the Andhra government to allot lands at 99 paise per acre to IT firms and GCCs.
The PIL calls these policies unconstitutional. It seeks to quash all land allotments, sale agreements, etc., executed under these policies, including all allotments made at the nominal price of 99 paise per acre.
However, the order allotting land to Raiden for the Google AI data centre does not mention that it comes under any of these policies. The order was only cited to illustrate to the court that the policy framework was being applied “arbitrarily” to land allotments, Gurumoorthy said.
He said that his petition does not seek cancellation of the land allotment for the AI data centre made to Raiden Infotech or to any other specific company.
A government order allotting 480 acres of land to Raiden Infotech was issued on December 2, 2025, around two months after the Google AI data centre was announced. The land allotment order says that Raiden is affiliated with Google and that it would carry out the project with partner companies from the Adani Group and Bharti Airtel.
The massive 1-gigawatt data centre would mean an investment of Rs 87,520 crore (USD 10 billion) in Andhra Pradesh. While critics questioned the environmental costs of the project, Karnataka government officials also wondered how the government was able to afford the subsidies offered to the Google data centre.
The order allotting land to Raiden, however, did not mention whether it would be given at the nominal price.
Meanwhile, other allotments made at the nominal price mention certain conditions for the company. For instance, an order allotting 27.10 acres of land in Visakhapatnam to the real estate firm Raheja Corp at 99 paise to build an “IT office space and residential space” specifies that the allotment is made on the condition that “the company creates 15,000 jobs".
Gurumoorthy alleged that the challenged policies were deliberately designed to “alienate valuable public resources to private parties under arrangements that are devoid of any enforceable rights or creation of enduring benefits for the State of Andhra Pradesh".
“The policies lack transparent, objective, and enforceable criteria for land allotments. The framework enables arbitrary and potentially illegal allotment of scarce public resources. Accountability mechanisms for monitoring compliance and enforcing commitments made by private allottees are conspicuously absent,” his statement said.
Gurumoorthy’s petition seeks specific guidelines for future allotment of government lands, including a transparent bidding process as the default, strict conditions for allotments linked with milestones, mandatory environmental and social impact assessments for large-scale projects in ecologically sensitive zones, enforceable performance obligations regarding investment and job creation with penalty/reentry clauses, and transparency in the operations of the State Investment Promotion Board (SIPB).